Sunday Star-Times

Speed listening breaks the disability barrier

- Rob Stock

Your average reader can around 250 words a minute.

That’s pretty fast but it’s nothing like the 425 words a minute ANZ’s global head of accessibil­ity Hamish McKenzie can manage.

And McKenzie is blind, after losing his sight in a car crash in 1996.

McKenzie, who is based in Australia, uses screen reading software to do his job, which involves ensuring the bank’s digital channels are as accessible as possible to people with disabiliti­es.

‘‘I can comfortabl­y comprehend at 425 words per minute. I can listen at 550-600, and get the general gist of what’s going on,’’ he says.

This enables him to function at a high level at work, and he’s not even among the fastest speed-listeners making their way in the workforce.

‘‘I know young guys who are listening at 700 words a minute, which sounds like complete and utter gibberish to me,’’ McKenzie says.

Speed listening is a skill that takes time to develop.

‘‘It’s probably a couple of years, to be honest,’’ McKenzie said.

For each individual it’s a process of dialling up the speed every couple of months to find the ‘‘wall’’ – the maximum they can comfortabl­y listen at.

His New Zealand-based ANZ colleague Asima Leone is just starting on the journey to find his wall.

McKenzie is aware that ignorance of such life-enhancing technology is widespread, but isn’t bothered.

‘‘It’s not like people are ‘screw all the people with disabiliti­es because they are just a small part of the population’,’’ get through McKenzie says. ‘‘They just don’t know. It’s not malice.’’

But it’s ignorance that can employment prejudice.

A survey of blind and partially sighted adults across three countries showed Australia had the lowest full-time employment rate at 24 per cent, followed by Canada at 28 per cent, while New Zealand had the highest with only 32 per cent.

McKenzie’s job is to make ANZ’s digital channels as accessible as possible, which benefits a surprising number of people.

It involves focusing on factors as simple as colour contrast so that customers with impaired sight can bank electronic­ally as easily as possible. It’s something most people would give no thought to, and not notice that they can still do their banking outside on bright days when the sun is glaring off the screen.

They also may not notice that electronic banking with one hand is not as hard as they might have expected.

And ultimately, everyone faces some level of disability at some stage of their lives. McKenzie says half the population has a sight, hearing, or other disability at age 65. result in

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 ??  ?? Hamish McKenzie and ANZ colleague Asima Leone benefit from speed-listening technology.
Hamish McKenzie and ANZ colleague Asima Leone benefit from speed-listening technology.

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